NE Fisheries Summit Asks if Thousands of tons of Fish Left in Water, Where Are They?
SEAFOODNEWS.COM [Cape Cod Times] By Doug Fraser - March 3, 2015 -
BOSTON, The big windows at the University of Massachusetts Club, 33 floors up into the Boston skyline, filled like bright blue boxes of a cloudless sky that descended into Boston Harbor. It felt like the world had turned a corner and a long winter was finally drawing to a close.
The fishermen, scientists, fishery regulators and environmentalists who slogged through slushy streets and half-cleared sidewalks below could only wish that the summit they were attending Monday had a similar sunny prospect. But this was not a meeting to announce some dramatic turnaround for the beleaguered New England fishing industry. This was a rallying of the troops in advance of a new fishing year in May that promised deeper gloom than the one just past.
For the 2015 fishing year, for instance, the Gulf of Maine cod quota has been reduced from 1,550 metric tons to just 386 metric tons. In 1991, fishermen caught more than 17,000 metric tons.
“If we are going to advance, then we are all in this together,” U.S. Rep. William Keating, D-Mass., told the audience. “The myth we have to break down is that this is an industry that doesn’t appreciate the science. They live it, they see it, and they could be more important partners...
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